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iTunes Plus Adding Indie Labels, Dropping Prices to 99 cents

arstechnica.com — After months of a catalog limited to EMI and priced inexplicably higher at $1.29 Apple is adding indie labels as well as dropping prices in their DRM free store.

Who dugg this? Made popular Oct 16, 2007

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  • daGUY, on 10/17/2007, -1/+121If true, I'm sure this is in response to Amazon's MP3 store. After all, Amazon has a much more expansive DRM-free catalogue, AND all of their songs are 99¢. Apple can't use iPod compatibility as a selling point either, since Amazon's tracks are just MP3s.

    Definitely a step in the right direction. Hopefully this paves the way for ALL music to be DRM-free one day.
  • ementis, on 10/17/2007, -7/+116do i get a 30c store credit?

    =P
  • stalefries, on 10/17/2007, -2/+56Well, it was also double the bitrate. I still agree.
  • fkr3, on 10/17/2007, -7/+58Right. Because iTunes needs to become an audio version of youtube and be flooded with stupid crap from people with no talent.
  • zeptobyte, on 10/17/2007, -1/+42Actually, most of the Amazon MP3s I've seen have been 89 cents. :o
  • newbill123, on 10/17/2007, -4/+44I hope one day Apple allows dot Mac subscribers to sell their Garage Band creations on the iTunes music store and completely cut out the record label (if you can do your own promotion).
  • ddcrandall, on 10/16/2007, -0/+39And the walls come tumbling down.

    As soon as the RIAA started suing everybody, the fate of the mainstream record industry was sealed.
  • craprock, on 10/17/2007, -0/+38Agreed. As much as I love Apple, competition is good for the customers.
  • redheadguy719, on 10/17/2007, -13/+44finally, it was ridiculous for itunes to charge extra for drm-FREE songs
  • MonkeyFarts, on 10/17/2007, -1/+28Why even require a .Mac account? I think it would be great if artists could just use iTunes as a medium to sell & promote their work, period.
  • chambana, on 10/17/2007, -10/+36God Bless Amazon.com
  • rjn17960, on 10/17/2007, -1/+26But still quite a bit less than $220,000.00.
  • munkyxtc, on 10/17/2007, -0/+15Only .15
  • Lou3000, on 10/16/2007, -2/+16So why can't we upgrade for free?
  • ThinkBox, on 10/16/2007, -1/+13I love that.

    Everyone today feels like they are entitled to something. and If they don't get what they think a company should give to them, they sue. How about suing the RIAA? They are the ones trying to SCREW EVERYONE AND SUE THEM. But you think because you can get a buck, you will sue Apple, the people who are actually trying to change the way people BUY music.
  • geminitojanus, on 10/16/2007, -1/+11http://tunecore.com

    You can already do this.
  • BossKey, on 10/19/2007, -3/+12Does that mean that the work you do is also not worth getting paid for?
  • Dorepoll, on 10/17/2007, -1/+9Wait, how did this become a Microsoft bash already?
  • zweben, on 10/16/2007, -1/+9I didn't hear anyone, including Apple fans, claim not to want 99 cent DRM free songs. Some people were just thankful that Apple was offering DRM free tracks at all. Others complained about the price difference.

    Just to get it straight, Apple's DRM free music came way before Amazon's. As far as I know, Apple was the first major online store to offer DRM free songs. In fact, it was most likely Amazon's more recent offering of DRM free songs at 99 cents that forced Apple (or more correctly, the labels) to lower the iTunes store prices.

    If you want to complain when incremental progress is made instead of sudden leaps, go right ahead, but don't start whining if you get your way and suddenly things stop progressing at all.
  • MacParrot, on 10/17/2007, -0/+7Apple (and Amazon and every other e-music seller) makes their cut. As they should. No point in doing it otherwise. As far as the artists go, they pretty much signed any control over their music when they went with the major labels. I understand WHY they did it. For most bands, there's almost no other way to get to the top except through the big labels. The labels make the lion's share of any profit and they always will unless you become big enough or last long enough to re-negotiate your contract.
    A long time ago Charlie Chaplin and other famous for their time movie stars got tired of getting screwed by their studios and created United Artists. It's fallen far from its roots, but that is something that music artists need to do if they want to take control of their careers back.
  • Zero2aHero, on 10/16/2007, -3/+9Thanks Steve? Do you think these songs would be offered for $.99 if it wasn't for Amazon?

    This announcement would have probably been... "more labels on board!", but thanks to Amazon it looks like it's going to be "more labels on board and cheaper prices (because we had to)!"

    You do owe someone thanks, but it's not Steve Jobs. If you are going to give him all of the appreciation for this move, shouldn't you also be showing him angst over wanting to charge you extra for a song file given to you in the way it should have been all along? Take the bad with the good...
  • MisterNoMoniker, on 10/16/2007, -0/+6I dunno what a Serato is, or what it's all about, but AAC is a great compression format. It's significantly better quality at the same bit rate, so at the higher bit rates apple is offering those are really good sounding files.
    AAC is actually an open standard by the MPEG standards board, the DRM was all that was Apple specific. I think it's a shame that other players aren't supporting it.
  • Lynxpro, on 10/16/2007, -0/+5
    This is definitely a good move, although I'd be willing to pay the extra $0.30 due to the files being in 256Kbps AAC versus the tracks on Amazon being 256Kbps MP3. Its too bad that none of the other labels would join EMI in this endeavor.

    Its also too bad that Sony can't get SonyBMG to join in on the fun, since the PS3, the PSP, the Walkmans and SonyEricsson phones would also benefit from DRM free commercial AAC tracks. I'm willing to bet that it is backwards looking Bertlesmann (BMG) that is holding up the deal. They are as big of wankers as Edgar Bronfman of Warner Music is. Wait...that isn't humanly possible. I swear I saw on South Park him getting abducted and being given the Biggest Douchebag in the Universe Award. Either it was Bronfman or John Edward, or a tie...I can't remember now for certain.
  • Zero2aHero, on 10/17/2007, -1/+6This is a fine question. I almost paid to upgrade an album yesterday, does this mean later this week that will be a free upgrade?
  • xoineg, on 10/16/2007, -1/+6not that many people like indie music. it is a small fraction of the overall music business. They can do it alone, but unless BIG artist cut the middle man (music companies) we are still going to have to put up with their *****.
  • MacParrot, on 10/19/2007, -2/+7Not being able to afford something doesn't give you the right to get it for free. Music and other forms of entertainment are not rights. They are not essential to survival like food and water. Get over this false sense of entitlement.
    Unless of course the music from these sites are license free
  • mklcom, on 10/16/2007, -0/+5The songs you get from eMuisc are mp3s. You do not lose them when your subscription ends. Unless you delete them yourself. It is not like other subscription services.
  • cawpin, on 10/17/2007, -1/+6What? That would be kind of like 75% of music anyway.
  • TjLAXattack, on 10/17/2007, -1/+6Now all we need is the rumored movie rentals for 30 days for less than $5. And tv show pricing probably should come down.
  • Protoss, on 10/16/2007, -0/+4That would be nice, especially if they were DRM-free.
  • signal15, on 10/16/2007, -2/+6It's great they lowered the price. Too bad that if you buy a track that comes from EMI you are still giving money to the devil. Buy indie!
  • Trax91, on 10/16/2007, -2/+6Amen to that
  • colincornaby, on 10/16/2007, -0/+3I don't think "Apple Apologists" were against 99 cents DRM free songs. We just wished people would stop whining about DRM free when it was never something Apple had the power to do. The labels always wanted DRM on their tracks. Now that's changed. Apple's stance never has changed. It's the stance of the labels that is changing.
  • mtappenden, on 10/16/2007, -3/+6The DRM never affected me, I only buy iTunes Plus for the higher bitrate, but this is certainly a welcome move.
  • tnoy, on 10/16/2007, -3/+6Just add an option to not display said content. Problem solved.
  • weareglass, on 10/16/2007, -0/+3I think killa is saying no to major labels as well. Is that so hard to believe?
  • mklcom, on 10/16/2007, -0/+3You do know that the IPod plays mp3s right? You don't have to use AAC. All of your music would work just fine without any changes.
  • weareglass, on 10/16/2007, -2/+5I find it really hard to believe Apple, the company that was so gung-ho about 99 cents or nothing would desire to create a two-tiered pricing system. More likely it was a concession to convince the labels, and now that they've let Amazon get in on lower pricing, it's harder for them to justify having higher prices to Apple.

    This is really good news, but so long as Apple is still using AAC, mostly because it's incompatible with Serato, I'll keep using Amazon.
  • KSUdesigner, on 10/19/2007, -0/+3I agree, but food and water aren't free either. Before you know it we'll be paying for air.
  • tnoy, on 10/16/2007, -1/+4I know a few people that think of iTunes as the only source of music for their iPod.
  • emocean, on 10/16/2007, -1/+3eMusic?

    ::
  • br0ken1128, on 10/16/2007, -0/+2I was about to say the same thing.. tunecore is easy and affordable, plus you get your music into many other stores as well, including Amazon ..
  • glind, on 10/16/2007, -0/+2I'm a big fan of the emusic catalog, but their customer service is horrible. The per track prices are decent, but if you don't download the 20 or 30 tracks that you are allotted every month, you lose that money. Gone. If you try to get out of the contract, they give you the serious run-around. Granted the business model is tough to sustain, but I loved it when you could get unlimited downloads for $30 and no throttle on the number of tracks at a time.
  • 8bit_Hero, on 10/16/2007, -0/+2I love that prices jump to $1.29 and it's "Damn RIAA" then a price cut happens and it's "Thanks Steve".
  • MacParrot, on 10/16/2007, -0/+2dugg2hard, you don't say what player you have, but quite a few of them support playing AAC files. Naturally, they won't play AAC files that have been encoded with Apple's DRM. AAC ISN'T Apple's proprietary audio format. It's as much an open standard as MP3.
  • munkyxtc, on 10/16/2007, -1/+3Top 100 downloads of the day are .89; everything else is .99 -- at least that's how their website reads.
  • taintedzodiac, on 10/16/2007, -2/+4I'm willing to bet 99% of the world has never heard of Goozic.com, so obviously there is still a need for the record labels (or, hopefully, a more popular website).
  • Swift2, on 10/16/2007, -0/+2It's important to remember that this is a Universal play. They're the ones who have refused to go DRM-free in iTunes, and whose offerings are most of the Amazon store. Apple decided to offer $1.29 to the labels as an inducement to go DRM-free. Universal wants to control its own prices, with the latest hit at $1.99 if they think people will pay, and .69 for some of the crap in their archives. So they'll undersell iTunes now, but will they later? Frankly, I don't care. Once there are more more DRM-free sources, and price competition, we're headed for .25 a tune, no DRM, baby! Sales will skyrocket. Will Apple care? Why should they? Eventually, the market will have to go peer-to-peer to save on bandwidth. Prices will head down.

    Universal, in fact, has an interesting idea: buy a new player from them and get yer Universal music free. Won't work, unless it works with other labels, but it's an interesting idea. I say, the more the merrier. Madonna signs not with a label, where she's only sold 10,000,000 CDs in the last ten years, but with a live show promoter, where she's made about $300,000,000. The CDs might be giveaways at the concerts. Meanwhile, big bands are selling, and giving it away. Sooner or later, we'll have a music renaissance again.
  • allanpat, on 10/16/2007, -0/+2Serato is a turntable mp3 software. It comes with 2 vinyl records that will play mp3's off your computer, so you can use records & scratch with them. Most DJs that you see in clubs with an apple laptop & only 2 records are using Serato.
  • chrisfix, on 10/16/2007, -0/+2You can already sell music on itunes without a label..
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